Indonesian Tsunami Highlights:

Limits of Early Warning Systems

Gaps in the warning technology - Chandrapala

July 19 - For thousands of tourists along a 176 kilometer(110)-mile stretch of coastline on Indonesia's Java island, the first warning of Monday's tsunami was the roar of 3- metre (9.8-foot) waves crashing onto the beach.

Tsunami warning centres in Indonesia, Australia, Malaysia, Sri Lanka and Thailand received alerts between 15 minutes and an hour after the 7.7-magnitude earthquake struck on July 17. At least 379 died on the coast of Java, where no warning was given.

Nineteen months after more than 220,000 people across Asia and Africa died in a tsunami triggered by a quake near Indonesia, countries around the Pacific and Indian Oceans have developed or bolstered early warning systems.

The problem: beaches haven't been equipped to sound the alarm when waves are approaching. "In Hawaii, the back of every beach has a siren which sounds if there's a tsunami warning," Brian Kennett, a seismology professor at Australian National University, said from Canberra. ``It's a major effort to make sure that every beach in the island of Java would be monitored in such a way.''

Monday's tsunami came too fast for alerts to be activated, Indonesian Vice President Jusuf Kalla said after a Tuesday night Cabinet meeting to discuss the disaster.

"Between the quake and the tsunami there was only 15 minutes," Kalla said.

Early warnings need "more time than that."

Ring of Fire

This week's quake was the latest in a rash of seismic activity around Indonesia. A May 27 quake killed more than 5,700 people south of Yogjakarta.

In March, 2005 more than 1,300 people died on Nias and other islands near Sumatra after a quake and tsunami, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.

Areas around Mount Merapi on Java were evacuated earlier this year amid concerns that the volcano would erupt.

The world's largest archipelago runs from the Indian to the Pacific Oceans and sits on one arc of what is called the Pacific Ring of Fire, marked by hundreds of seismic fault lines. On Dec. 26, 2004, a magnitude-9 quake struck off the coast of Indonesia's Aceh province generating waves that hit coastlines with almost no warning.

"The problem is, if the epicenter is close to land, then the waves can hit no sooner (than) you feel the earthquake," said Lalith Chandrapala, deputy director of Sri Lanka's Department of Meteorology.

"In low-lying areas, people have no time to reach shelter. This is what happened in Aceh."

Monday's quake occurred 240 kilometers (150 miles)from the town of Tasikmalaya, near the Indonesian coast.

`Not Sufficient'

"A locally generated tsunami may reach a nearby shore in less than 10 minutes," according to the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center based in Hawaii.

Malaysia's seismic station detected Monday's quake ``within a few minutes'' of it occurring, said Yap Kok Seng, director general of Malaysia's Meteorological Services Department.

Within half an hour, the country had received warnings from the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center and Japan's Meteorological Agency, which both provide tsunami warnings for Indian Ocean nations.

"The warning from the PTC and JMA is very useful," Yap said, referring to the two tsunami-warning agencies. "Now it's a matter for countries like Indonesia to get the information to the locals immediately. If the tsunami hits the coast within half an hour, you require a response that's much faster than half an hour."

`Ocean Queen'

For the Ocean Queen, a resort in Indonesia's Pelabuhan Ratu consisting of 18 beachfront bamboo huts facing the Indian Ocean, the first news of the tsunami risk came when they were contacted by Bloomberg half an hour after the quake.

The West Java resort, which didn't suffer damage, immediately evacuated about 60 guests and 40 staff members, according to President-Director Nick Andrews.

"We're very grateful for the warning because there wasn't one locally," Andrews said afterwards. "We may install sirens after this incident because it will warn people faster. The government should put a system in place."

In Thailand, where more than 5,000 people died in the 2004 tsunami, 65 tsunami warning towers were erected in six southwest provinces affected by that disaster, Pakdivat Vagipanlop, an air vice marshal stationed at the National Disaster Warning Center in Bangkok, said yesterday. By the end of this year there will be 79 towers sounding alarms triggered by satellite alerts from earthquake and wave data.

Taking Precautions

Sri Lanka's meteorology department was alerted by the island's only seismic station 12 minutes after the quake hit and subsequently received warnings from the two agencies, according to Sri Lanka's Chandrapala.

"The system worked well and we made the correct decision not to issue a warning for Sri Lanka," Chandrapala said. More than 30,000 people died in Sri Lanka in the 2004 tsunami.

Chandrapala said the U.S. government planned to set up two buoys measuring wave activity along Sri Lanka's northeastern coast by September.

"There are still gaps in the warning system," he said.

A tsunami alert system for nations bordering the Indian Ocean has gradually come on line since April and is operational, Koichiro Matsuura, director general of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, said on June 28 in Paris. Some 26 information analysis centres capable of receiving and distributing tsunami advisories have been activated in Indian Ocean countries, he said.

They are linked to 25 seismological stations and three deep-sea sensors. Matsuura said last month the system would be further improved by the end of the year, when it will be capable of "faster detection" of tsunamis and greater precision in locating the epicenter of earthquakes that cause the deadly waves.

(Straits Times)